by Holly Hood
Table of contents
Anonymous
Acknowledgements
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Chapter 40
Chapter 41
Chapter 42
Chapter 43
Chapter 44
Chapter 45
Chapter 46
Chapter 47
Chapter 48
Chapter 49
Chapter 50
Chapter 51
Chapter 52
Chapter 53
Chapter 54
Chapter 55
Chapter 56
Chapter 57
Books also by Holly Hood
Perfectly Hopeless
The brown eyed boy
What ails you?
Sparks
Anything is better
Art
Mysterious
Isn’t it obvious?
Time
Feelings
Horrible Gossip
Uninvited
Useless issues
Gift
Sunbeams
Unsure
What ifs
Tactics
Escape
Is this the way?
Take it
Who said?
Fall
About the author
ALSO BY Holly Hood
RUN
Acknowledgments
Birth
June 7th
June 8th
June 16th
June 17th
June 18th
June 20th
June 21st
June 23rd
June 25th
June 27th
June 28th
July 2nd
July 4th
July 5th
July 7th
July 8th
July 9th
July 10th
July 12th
July 15th
July 19th
July 21st
July 22nd
July 23rd
July 25th
July 26th
July 27th
July 28th
The end
Anonymous
Holly Hood
Copyright © 2014 by Holly Hood
Cover and interior book design by Holly Hood
Images © Nicola_Del_Mutolo - Fotolia.com
© serov - Fotolia.com
Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise) without the prior written permission of the above author of this book.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, brands, media, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. The author acknowledges the trademark owners of various products referenced in this work of fiction, which have been used without permission. The publication/use of these trademarks is not authorized, associated with, or sponsored by the trademark owners.
Anonymous
Acknowledgements
It is simply because I feel certain things about life that I wrote this book. I would like to thank the people that do not even know that they are being thanked. Thank you for your screw-ups, thank you for your faults. Without them I wouldn’t have what it takes to write this book. You are not perfect, you might not ever be, but I still love you.
And to Anne, every day I thank you for being my biggest fan. You always supported my writing. And I hope you still do. I love you and miss you. Rest in peace, lady!
“Love is that condition in which the happiness of another person is essential to your own.”
― Robert A. Heinlein
Dedicated to everyone who makes mistakes and isn’t perfect. Dedicated to the ones that are okay with that.
Dedicated to everyone reading this book, you sparkle my heart!
Chapter 1
Guilt.
It plagued her. She swam in the nauseating guilt of her life— all day, every day.
She dropped her head inside the toilet bowl. She wished she could keep it all in because it helped solve her newest problem. It outdid any problem from before and there were lots of them.
As she listened to her family on the other side of her bedroom door, she wished they would just go away and leave her alone. Let her succumb to her mistakes. It would make things easier for so many people.
One more knock before a loud racket, they broke the door down.
“Elle, we have to go now. They’re waiting,” Elle’s mother said. It pained her to see her daughter like this, she couldn’t stomach it. Every time she looked at her it took her back to when she was a little girl with the most incredible smile, a laugh that never went away and so much energy.
This wasn’t her daughter. She was just the shell of what once was.
“I’m not going,” Elle said, covering her face, she dropped her head against her arm and closed her eyes and started to cry. Just in time for her brother, Nick, to come into the room.
He was older. He cared about her, but it hurt to see someone he was so close to fall apart. He didn’t know how to help her anymore, but he wanted to say good-bye.
He dropped to one knee and pulled her tangled hair from the toilet water. She reeked of booze. Her skin was cold and clammy, and she looked like death.
He patted her on the arm. “Elle, let’s go. Let me help you to the car.”
She sobbed even louder when he brought her to her feet.
The family helped Elle down the stairs, through the hallway of their upper-class home, and down the porch steps. Her parents kept their eyes glued to the yellow cab outside their house that waited for Elle. They refused to look at the neighbors as they judged her and made snide comments.
Nick raised his head high. He refused to break under so much pressure. He glared at Mr. Hopkins as he sprayed his rose bushes. He held back the urge to flip him the bird, or break something— instead he squeezes Elle’s hand before she climbed into the backseat, her sobs hurt his ears as she begged them to let her die.
Elle groaned as her mother hoisted her upright, and buckled her seat belt for her. She smoothed her hair and placed a soft kiss on her temple.
“I love you, Elle,” she whispered.
Elle didn’t answer. She didn’t have it in her. If she loved her, she wouldn’t let her go this way. She would let her go the way she wanted.
Her mother wiped her tears, and did her best to keep it together in front of the neighbo
rs.
Her daughter made a big mess. She knew how they felt. She sometimes felt the same.
Elle‘s bad choices took her away from them, and no one knew where to find her. She was captive— a prisoner in her own skin; she clung to her sanity the one way she knew how. She closed her eyes when Nick pulled her in for a hug, and let him squeeze her tight.
They just wanted her back, the girl who used to laugh.
Chapter 2
Chapter 2
She wasn't sure what made her weaker than anyone else, but she accepted that she was. Guilt ran her life now. She was a prisoner.
Her gaze bounced from one wall to the next as she allowed the staff to check her body. Check her body for anything unsafe or illegal. They took anything she could harm herself or others with. And made sure she wasn't smuggling in narcotics.
"She's clear," the skinny woman said, jerking her head to the side, her eyeglasses perched at the tip of her nose. She handed over Elle's suitcase to the big burly man and handed Elle a little container. Elle brought her eyes from the small cup to the thin woman's frown.
She took Elle in- maybe for the first time, and she slid her glasses back in place.
"Standard procedure, you pee in this container, and then we are on to the next step." She raised an eyebrow, waiting for a dispute. It wouldn't be the first time someone defied procedure. Addicts regularly broke the rules, just about anyone who entered the doors of Gray Hope was pretty much the same. Nobody liked being told what to do. Nobody was happy entering a drug treatment facility, and most were there because it was rehab or jail. Circumstances like that were bound to make anyone unhappy.
Elle extended her hand, a dull ache reminding her that she was still alive and miserable. She didn't bother speaking. She watched the big guy lug her suitcases to the hall. He stopped at the third door on the left, dropping them in front of the door.
"Look. If you want to see your room, we need to get this out of the way."
Elle nodded in a daze. She knew the only thing that she would find in her system was alcohol and lots of it. She drank as much as she could before they carted her off via taxi cab. She wasn't surprised to see this skinny woman watching her every move.
Elle stared at the plain white walls, running her fingers along the waistline of her shorts until she located the buttons. She sat down on the toilet, feeling zero. She wasn't embarrassed. The lack of privacy didn't bother her. She lost the right to privacy. After what she did it didn't matter.
She closed the cap, setting it on the sink.
"My name is Lora Gordon. I was once in your shoes. I have been clean and sober for fifteen years. If I did it, you can too," Lora told her.
Elle swallowed, staring Lora down. "You killed your best friend?"
Lora shifted her necklace of access keys to all the doors in the facility crashed against her chest. "Well no, my addiction never reached the point to harm anyone, but I can relate."
Elle wished she could accept what Lora had to say to her. "Addiction is not the problem. The problem is me. I did something, and now I am here because of it."
Lora shook her head, disagreeing with her, which only agitated her further. "You wouldn't have done what you did if you weren't an addict. So now we are here to help you get better."
"So, I am here to learn how to use addiction as an excuse for what I've done?" Elle shoved her hair behind her ear and adjusted her top.
"It's not an excuse. It's a problem you need to learn how to deal with your life again, in a healthy way." Lora dipped the testing strip, checking over the results. "Ok. Now we can move to the next step. Your humble abode." She pulled her hands out of the surgical gloves and led Elle down the hall to her new living quarters.
Lora's heart already opened up for this girl. Sadness radiated from her. It wasn't hard to look into her ice-blue eyes and see how despondent she was. There was not a stitch of life left in her, Lora remembered that was how she felt when she entered treatment.
She watched Elle wander down the hall defeated. Unlocking her door, she flicked on the light, letting Elle go in first. She watched her take in her new environment.
"I didn't want a roommate," Elle said, shuffling over to the first bed. She took a seat, unsure what to do next. Lora left, returning with her two suitcases. She unzipped the first quickly unfolding every clothing item and doing a careful job of checking every crevice for anything harmful to Elle.
"Everyone has a roommate. It’s part of life here," Lora said, folding her red T-shirt back up and returning it to the suitcase.
"Well, I would prefer to sleep alone," Elle said. However her pleas for privacy fell upon deaf ears. Lora finally concluded her inspection of her belongings finding nothing harmful or against the rules. She gave a quick smile and then shut the door, leaving Elle to herself. Just as relief was settling in at the thought of being alone, the door opened back up.
"I forgot to mention the doctor will be meeting with you in fifteen minutes," Lora reminded her. Meetings were tough, opening up to someone was hard. However, they all had to do it.
"My roommate. Where is she?" Elle asked quickly.
"She's in a group session. Her name is Sadie. She knows you're coming." Lora gave her one more smile, not receiving anything in return, but this didn't bother her. She would try again next time.
Elle let out a long sigh, not moving from her spot on the bed. She raised her feet off the floor, staring down at her shoes. As her muscles grew tense and pain radiated up her thighs, she released the pose, falling back on the bed, her hand rested on her stomach.
"Fuck my life," Elle muttered to herself, and she meant it.
"I said the same thing," someone said from the door, someone who sounded a lot more delighted than her. She didn't bother to sit up. But that didn't stop her from making it around the bed. She took her in from the upside-down position. She took in her freckled skin and Auburn hair, and wondered if her rosy cheeks and dark-red lips were natural or store-bought.
"I'm Sadie. You're my new roommate," Sadie said staring at the gaunt form draped over the bed.
"Elle," Elle said back, hoping she would leave.
"Were you named after Elle McPherson?"
"I wouldn't know. I never bothered to ask," Elle said, closing her eyes to get away from this Sadie character. She hoped Sadie would take a hint and just leave her alone. She didn't want to talk to anybody.
"Well, I like it," Sadie said, and she meant it. She took a seat on her bed, pulling out her journal from the bedside table. Each bed had one. She wondered if Elle had anything to store in hers.
"I don't like talking. So don't bother," Elle said, she rolled over, turning her back to Sadie. She curled up in a ball, working her head into her pillow.
"I'm sure you will sooner or later," Sadie said back.
"Nope. Don't bother."
"Word is you're an alcoholic, and that you killed someone. Well… that's the word." Sadie closed her journal, waiting for some response. The girl wasn't looking too responsive. She kept her eyes on her back waiting for something—for anything.
"I killed someone," Elle said out loud. It was more to herself then to Sadie. She still couldn't wrap her brain around that truth.
"And you're an alcoholic, or do you use other things too?" Sadie asked.
"I'm not an alcoholic. They just want me to say that I am to make what I did look like some accident so they can fix me," Elle said, her words coming out lifeless.
"You don't think you're fixable?" Sadie asked.
"Nothing can fix this. Can fixing me bring back my friend? No. Nothing will fix this," Elle said. Nothing would make her life okay again. Nothing would bring back the one thing she destroyed all on her own.
Nothing.
Chapter 3
Elle sat in a very open office. She wasn’t sure it was even considered an office. More a room with two seats, a desk in the far corner and a lot of open space, she didn’t like open space. She didn’t like light anymore either for that matter.
<
br /> She crossed her arms, bringing her chin down to meet her chest, and then she closed her eyes, trying to hold on to the last of her drunkenness. Reality slipped away as she started to fall asleep. The clock ticked softly behind her.
“Sorry to keep you waiting,” someone said from behind her.
Elle didn’t budge.
“Elle, my name is Dr. Jon. Glad to see you made it here safely,” Dr. Jon said waiting for Elle to greet him. When she failed to lift her head and let him know if she was alive he made it around to the front of her chair, extending a finger and gently tapping her on her shoulder. Her head snapped up, and he watched as she sucked in air.
“Elle, let’s take you back to your room. We can have our conversation from there. You’re not looking very well,” Dr. Jon told her.
She shook her head and shuffled back into the hallway.
“Dr. Jon,” a man said in passing, Elle met his eyes for a brief second, he watched her pass by as he chewed on a straw from his fast food container.
“Back so soon?” Dr. Jon said, giving a hearty chuckle.
“I wanted my old room. They said that’s not possible,” he said watching Elle and Dr. Jon make their way further down the hall.
“That’s because we filled it since you went away. It’s been almost a year, Hart,” Dr. Jon said. He opened the door for Elle allowing her entry first. Elle plopped down on her bed, slinging an arm over her face; she didn’t want to look at him. In all the time that had passed she never laid eyes on her doctor. And this made her feel better. In some strange way she felt better for such a stupid thing.
“It seems you made it through all of our hurdles so far. So one more for the day can’t be that big of a deal, right?” Dr. Jon pulled up a chair; he crossed his legs, smoothing his slacks, his shiny black dress shoe jiggling up and down as he waited for her to respond. He was ready.
“Elle, can you tell me what your drug of choice is,” he asked clearing his throat.
“I’m sure that’s on the paperwork somewhere,” she said.
“I would like to hear it from you.”
“I don’t consider alcohol a drug.”
